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Like hot water, electricity and television, the automobile is not going anywhere and urban planning needs to reflect that, Public transportation needs to be cut and let the private sector take over in areas where it can be self supporting and put all that saved funding in improving roads and making city's more car friendly.

Tell that to the residents of NYC, a city that would shutdown without their public transit. They would probably laugh at you rather than argue with you, knowing their city is much more important than whatever small town you're from. Or tell that to the the public transit users in Portland, Oregon. Where 75% of public transit users owns a car but chooses not to use it.

With the rising costs of gas and growth in public transit users, I have to disagree with you.

Your insistence that people are using the roads for free because you want everyone to use public transportation gives a lot of people the impression you are just another whiny liberal who can't deal with the reality that other people don't share your desire to live in overpriced housing downtown and sit beside some stinking homeless person hauling bags of smelly beer cans and bottles on the train.

Americans pay for the roads through fuel taxes every time they purchase fuel. Additionally, people buying fuel pay for public transit projects.

In some cases local voters have approved a sales tax increase for transportation projects. These are never dedicated to roads, but to a variety of transportation projects.

You bring up a good point though. Why do we get asked to vote on any new mass-transit project or expansion, but states can freely spend billions of dollars every year on roads and highways however they want?

Good article. However, one huge factor not discussed is schools. One of the reasons that most cities do not attract the critical mass necessary to affect change is due to the fact that many middle-class families with children will not invest in a community that has poorly-performing schools. They may wholeheartedly agree with everything else but are unwilling to experiment with their child's future during their critical development years. Safety is another concern.

The passing of No Child Left Behind has further stratified many suburban communities with high test scores. Many middle-class families are willing to make sacrifices such as longer commuting times, higher fuel bills, and loss of convenience for their children's best interests.

Somehow this hurdle has to be overcome before we can move forward with redevelopment of the urban core with the younger families. There is resistance from many fronts as property values and the desirability of communities are highly correlated to the quality of schools. Anything that threatens that key characteristic (such as regionalization) will be met with strong opposition.

It may not be like this everywhere, but from my experience, poor schools and high crime are a direct result of the fleeing middle class. I don't know how it would be done, but IMO, the clear solution is to bring back the middle class.

Your insistence that people are using the roads for free because you want everyone to use public transportation gives a lot of people the impression you are just another whiny liberal who can't deal with the reality that other people don't share your desire to live in overpriced housing downtown and sit beside some stinking homeless person hauling bags of smelly beer cans and bottles on the train.

Americans pay for the roads through fuel taxes every time they purchase fuel. Additionally, people buying fuel pay for public transit projects.

In some cases local voters have approved a sales tax increase for transportation projects. These are never dedicated to roads, but to a variety of transportation projects.

Gasoline is subsidized. Ethanol gets a $0.51/gallon subsidy so whether you buy E85 or E10 you are getting a product for less than market value. Then there is the Energy Act of 2005 that throws money to fossil fuel producers. Then there are provisions for royalty reductions and exemptions for private producers on public lands. Add to this the cost of the strategic petroleum reserve as well as the protection of shipping lanes by our military.

I forgot then there is the whole issue of external costs that are never borne directly by the producers or consumers but still cost us beaucoup dollars. The costs of air and water pollution and greenhouse gas emissions are spread out across all of society instead of a fairer pay as you go approach.

Old style Ford Fiesta series was introduced in 1976 and continues into the newer Euro style Ford Fiesta is now rated one of the top economy cars for 2011 by consumer reports and various other reviewers.

Old style Ford Fiesta series was introduced in 1976 and continues into the newer Euro style Ford Fiesta is now rated one of the top economy cars for 2011 by consumer reports and various other reviewers.

The old one was fairly highly rated, too, till people started buying them and found out what pieces of junk they were.

Whoever started this thread never came back after posting. I think she was interested in starting a flame war on this forum. She showed up one time, posted a few rather anti-urban (and somewhat anti-gay) and then stopped and contributed nothing to the conversation.

I'm a car guy - I love to work on them and drive them - but after the rust started winning the war against my pickup, my fiancee and I got down to one car (hers). Now I get around via bike and transit in Baltimore, which is definitely not the norm and can be a bit frustrating. Despite being a dense city with tons of convenient rail transit pre-1963, this is very much a car city. The network of buses and two rapid rail lines is extensive but not often punctual. I've seen a lot better in other cities, but I've seen worse, also.

It's been an interesting experiment, and I've found that owning and using a bicycle is really what makes it tolerable. By biking 2 miles up to the transfer point instead of waiting for one bus just to wait for another, I'm really cutting down on my commute time. Plus my time on the bus is time to read or sleep, something I don't do enough of otherwise. The extra exercise is nice too.

But what's made me the most happy is the tons of money saved by not paying for auto repairs, gas and insurance on my old truck. It didn't seem like that much when I had the truck, $100/month insurance, $40 every 2 or 3 weeks for gas (didn't drive that much), but seeing it in my bank account, it feels like such a substantial amount. Now we've just got one old car to maintain instead of two.

From where we live we can walk to the grocery store, gym, farmers market and our favorite tavern, so we usually don't need to drive for short trips. That certainly helps.

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